The Gilded Seal

‘They’re here,’ he breathed. ‘They’ve found me.’

He turned away, instinctively heading against the flow of the procession to make it harder for anyone to follow him. Elbowing his way through the crush, he came to a narrow street and darted up it, past a drunk pissing in one doorway and some kids making out in another, the boy’s hand shoved awkwardly up the girl’s top. Halfway along, he veered right down a side alley where bright banners and wilting flowers hung lazily from low, sagging balconies.

He skidded to a halt outside a large wooden gate. The sign nailed to it indicated that the building was currently being renovated by Construción Pedro Alvarez. That meant it was empty.

It only took him a couple of seconds to spring the padlock open. He stepped inside and carefully closed the gate behind him, finding himself in a small courtyard littered with paint-spattered tools and broken terracotta tiles. A dog had fouled the large pile of sand immediately to his left.

In the middle stood a well. He made his way to it. It was disused, a black grille over the opening rendering the bucket suspended above it purely ornamental. This was as good a place as any.

A match flared in the darkness and he held it to his small notebook. The dry paper clutched at the flame, drawing it in like water, the fire gnawing hungrily at the pages’ pale skin until only the charred spine remained. He glanced towards the gate. He still had time. Time to leave some clue as to what he had discovered before it was too late.

The knife bit into his palm, the blood welling up through the deep gash and then oozing through his fingers, sticky and warm. He had barely finished when the gate burst open.

‘Está allí. Te dijé que le iba a encontrar. ¡Venga! ¡Venga! Antes de que se vaya.’ He’s in here. I told you I’d find him. Quick! Quick! Before he gets away.

He looked up and recognised the little boy he had lifted above the crowd earlier pointing triumphantly towards him, a cruel look in his eyes, blond hair shimmering like flames in the darkness.

Five men shot through the doorway, two of them overpowering him instantly by bending his right arm up behind his back and forcing him to his knees.

‘Did you really think you could hide from us, Rafael?’ came a voice from behind him.

He didn’t answer, knowing it was pointless.

‘Get him up.’

The grip on his arm relaxed slightly and he was dragged to his feet. A cold, blinding light snapped on. Rafael held his other hand up to his face, shielding his eyes. A video camera. The sick putas were filming this. They were filming the whole thing.

A shape materialised in front of him, a solid black outline silhouetted against the white light’s searing canvas, the world suddenly drained of all colour. The figure had a hammer in one hand and two six-inch masonry nails in the other that he had scooped up off the floor. A kaleidoscopic undershirt of tattoos disappeared up each sleeve and formed a rounded collar where they reappeared just below the neck line of his unbuttoned shirt.

Rafael felt himself being lifted so that his wrists were pressed flat against the wall either side of an open doorway. The video operator took up a position so he could get both men in shot.

‘Ready?’

Outside, Rafael heard muffled cheering and the faint sound of women wailing and crying. He knew then that La Macarena had finally appeared on the adjacent street, glass tears of grief at the loss of her only son frozen on to the delicate ecstasy of her carved face.

She was here. She was here for him.

PART ONE (#ulink_7a5377be-0159-54b1-8ddd-5542f174bb59)

Forsake not an old friend; for the new is not comparable to him; a new friend is as new wine; when it is old, thou shalt drink it with pleasure.

Ecclesiasticus 9:10

ONE (#ulink_3e30eb1e-d28a-5dfe-8cd2-d4f45004ce35)

Drumlanrig Castle, Scotland

18th April – 11.58 a.m.

As the car drew up, a shaft of light appeared through a break in the brooding sky. The castle’s sandstone walls glowed under its gentle touch, an unexpected shock of pink against the ancient greens of the surrounding hills and woodlands.

Tom Kirk stepped out and drew his dark overcoat around him with a shiver, turning the black velvet collar up so it hugged the circle of his neck. Ahead of him, blue-and-white police tape snapped in the icy wind where it had been strung across the opposing steps that curved up to the main entrance. Six feet tall, slim and square shouldered, Tom had an athletic although not obviously muscular build, his careful gestures and the precise way he moved hinting at a deliberate, controlled strength that was strangely compelling to watch.

It was his eyes that were most striking, though, an intense pale blue that suggested both a calm intelligence and an unflinching resolve. These were set into a handsome, angular face, his thick arching eyebrows matching the colour of his short brown hair, the firm line of his jaw echoing the sharp edge of his cheekbones and lending an air of measured self-confidence. The only jarring note came from the series of small fighting scars that flecked his knuckles, tiny white lines that joined and bisected each other like animal tracks across the savanna.

Looking up, he was suddenly struck by the almost deliberate extravagance of the castle’s elaborate Renaissance splendour compared to the artisinal, grey functionality of the neighbouring village he had just passed through. No doubt when it had been built that had been precisely the point, the building a crushing reminder to the local population of their lowly status. Now, however, the castle looked slightly out of place, as if it had emerged blinking into the new century, uncertain of its role and perhaps even slightly embarrassed by its outmoded finery.

In the distance, a police helicopter made a low pass over the neighbouring forest, the chop of its rotors muffled by the steady buzz of the radios carried by the twenty or so officers swarming purposefully around him. Tom shivered again, although this time it wasn’t the cold. This many cops always made him nervous.

‘Can I help you, sir?’ A policeman on the other side of the tape shouted over the noise. At the sound of his voice the thick curtain of cloud drew shut once again, and the castle faded back into its grey slumber.

‘It’s okay, Constable. He’s with me.’

Mark Dorling had appeared at the top of the left-hand staircase, a tall man wearing a dark blue double-breasted suit and a striped regimental tie. He waved him forward impatiently, Tom recognising in Dorling’s ever so slightly proprietary manner evidence, perhaps, of weekends spent visiting friends with houses of a similar size and stature.

The policeman nodded and Tom stooped under the tape and made his way up the shallow and worn steps to where Dorling was waiting for him, shoulders back, chin raised, fists balanced on each hip like a big game hunter posing over his kill. Oxford had been full of people like Dorling, Tom reflected. It was the eyes that gave them away, the look of scornful indifference tinged with contempt with which they surveyed the world, as if partly removed from it. At first Tom had been offended by this, resenting what appeared to be an instinctive disdain for anyone who didn’t share their privileged background or gilded future. But he had soon come to understand that behind those dead eyes lurked a cold fury at a world where the odds had so clearly been stacked in their favour, that their lives had been robbed of any sense of mystery or adventure. Far from contempt, therefore, what their expression actually revealed was a deep self-loathing, maybe even jealousy.

‘I wasn’t expecting you until later.’ Dorling welcomed him with a tight smile. Tom wasn’t offended by his accusing tone. People like Dorling didn’t like surprises. It disturbed the illusion of order and control they worked so hard to conjure up around themselves.

‘I thought you said you were in Milan?’ he continued, sweeping a quiff of thinning blond hair back off his forehead, a large gold signet ring gleaming on the little finger of his left hand.

‘I was,’ said Tom. ‘I got the early flight. It sounded important.’

‘It is,’ Dorling confirmed, his pale green eyes narrowing momentarily, his jaw stiffening. ‘It’s the Leonardo.’ A pause. ‘I’m glad you’re here Tom.’

Dorling gripped his hand unnecessarily hard, as if trying to compensate for his earlier brusqueness, his skin soft and firm. Tom said nothing, allowing this new piece of information to sink in for a few seconds before answering. The Madonna of the Yarnwinder. One of only fifteen paintings in the world thought to have been substantially painted by da Vinci. Conservatively worth $150 million. Probably more. In his business, it didn’t get much more important than that.

‘When?’

‘This morning.’

‘Anyone hurt?’

‘They overpowered a tour guide. She’s bruised but fine. More shocked than anything.’

‘Security?’

‘Rudimentary,’ Dorling gave an exasperated shrug. ‘It takes the police thirty minutes to get out here on a good day. These chaps were in and out in ten.’

‘Sounds like they knew what they were doing.’

‘Professionals,’ Dorling agreed.

‘Just as well it’s insured, then, isn’t it?’ Tom grinned. ‘Or aren’t Lloyd’s planning to pay up on this one?’

‘Why do you think you’re here?’ Dorling replied with a faint smile, the lines around his eyes and tanned cheeks deepening as his face creased, his eyes darkening momentarily.

‘The old poacher-turned-gamekeeper routine?’